"Trump Plans To Abolish Electric Vehicle Tax Credit"...Will Korean companies be hit?

[Anchor]
There have been reports that U.S. President-elect Trump's transition team is trying to abolish the electric vehicle tax credit under the Inflation Reduction Act.

We are concerned about the damage to our cars and battery companies that built factories in the United States to receive subsidies for electric vehicles.

This is Washington correspondent Kwon Jun-ki.

[Reporter]
Reuters reports that Trump's transition team is planning to abolish the $7,500 subsidy paid to buy electric vehicles.

An energy policy team led by the founder of an oil company and the governor of North Dakota is discussing the abolition of the electric vehicle tax credit.

Sources said several related meetings have already been held at Trump's home, Mar-a-Lago, and that the electric vehicle tax credit should be eliminated to secure the budget needed for Trump's tax reduction pledge.

Trump has vowed to abolish the electric vehicle tax credit at every presidential campaign, criticizing it as a waste of unnecessary money.

[Donald Trump / U.S. President-elect] Mandating electric vehicles is insane. In this case, everyone will have an electric car in a short period of time, but probably not everyone wants one.

Elon Musk's Tesla, which has been at the forefront of Trump's election, is also in favor of abolishing the tax credit, the news agency reported.

Musk explained that if the tax credit disappears, Tesla will suffer small damage, but if the subsidies are maintained, the rest of the oil car industry will be devastated.

[Donald Trump / U.S. President-elect] I love Elon. They gave me the strongest support. His Tesla is great, too. But he understands this, too. I don't even want support.

Compared to other clean energy support policies under the IRA law, the agency said electric vehicle tax credits would allow for broad consensus in Congress and viewed the revision of the law as an easy target.

Our automobile and battery industries, which have built or are building scale factories in the United States to receive electric vehicle subsidies, are expected to suffer a blow to their competitiveness if the tax credit is abolished.

This is YTN Kwon Jun-ki from Washington.